The Most Painful Gift I Ever Received

I would give anything to have her back. But her death gave me something I never expected - a mirror, a map, and a permission I hadn’t known I was waiting for. This is what grief taught me about happiness, truth, and choosing a life I actually want to live.

My mom died five years ago. And while so much has changed since then, grief is still part of my life. It hasn’t disappeared, like some people assume. Grief will never disappear, for me it has simply taken on new shapes. Some of them carry its own beauty and form into silent wisdom. Not a wisdom you learn. It's one that writes itself into your body, the kind you only carry because you lived through it. It’s in my choices, in my work, in how I live and see the world. For me, its when I finally felt in my bones what the f*** carpe diem actually means.

Grief is not a timeline. It’s not something that ends. And I believe it’s one of the most personal experiences we can go through, no one feels it the same way.

What you see here, what I share, what I’ve built with HUMAN NEST, it’s all the result of grief. The result of giving myself permission to live again. That’s why I’m sharing this reflection every year. Every year, it’s different.

For me, the fact that my mom died is the best and worst thing that ever happened to me. The worst, because I lost her. She was my family until I built my own. She was my best friend who knew all my secrets. She was the person who told me every day, “I love you.” I can tell you, the emptiness of not receiving these three words anymore was like I had been mentally beaten every day. Like something inside me was bruised and tender all the time.

She never cared about my job or how much money I made. She never cared about any of those things. She always said, “If it makes you happy, it makes me happy too.” And that used to trigger me so hard. I didn’t get it. I felt unseen, like she didn’t understand what I was working so hard for. Only now, after she’s gone, I understand what she really meant. And that’s the saddest part that it took me losing her to understand the depth of what she was trying to say. She didn’t care about achievements, she cared about me. About my real happiness. Not the one that looks good, but the one that feels true.

After she died, I started to make every decision differently. I began asking myself, would this really make me happy? Like truly happy? The kind of happy where your heart beats faster, where your eyes light up, where it feels like your whole body is saying yes. And it’s not always easy. Because following that path doesn’t always look like what society expects. But I know deep down, I would never be here, standing in this version of myself, with this kind of clarity and wisdom, if she hadn’t passed.

And yes, it is a hard thing to say, but a quiet part of me holds gratitude for her passing. Of course, not because I ever wanted it. Because only by saying this, her passing makes sense to me, like it was her gift. I would give anything to bring her back. I’d love to see her, to hold her, to tell her that I understand now. Even though I know she knows. I’d tell her I’m sorry it took me so long, but I get it. And I’m truly happy. I try every day to honor what she wished for me. And that means living from a place of truth. That means choosing what feels real, even when it’s uncomfortable.

What I’ve learned is that I can’t control what happens to me. But I can choose how I let the feelings move through me, and what I make out of the experience. That’s what I’ve decided to do. I truly believe that life is not fair or unfair - it just is. We’re here to experience it, with everything it brings. And I also believe that we are responsible for our own happiness. No one else can give it to us. No job, no title, no approval. And that’s the hardest part sometimes, to stay present with this truth, especially on the difficult days. But I try. Every single day I try.

Because life is fragile. And being here - being alive - is the greatest gift we have. Whether it’s what we call a good day or a bad day, it’s a good day, because we’re here. We’re experiencing something. We’re feeling. We’re learning. We’re becoming. And I hope, wherever you are, you’re happy too.